


Crossing Paper Thin Lines

by finkpishnets



Category: Degrassi
Genre: F/M, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-02
Updated: 2010-09-02
Packaged: 2017-10-28 13:00:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/308130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/finkpishnets/pseuds/finkpishnets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She knows she’s coping, knows she’s doing better, but it’s not the same. Not enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crossing Paper Thin Lines

**Author's Note:**

> Set circa 10x04. For the schmoop_bingo prompt ‘bubble bath’. Short and hopeful, I guess.

She’s back at Degrassi, back at the public school she’d desired so badly to leave, but it makes sense this time around.

Mostly.

She’s alone and that’s scary, more scary than Fiona had initially thought; sure, she has Holly J but she still hates her a little, tries not to, reminds herself over and over of her therapists words but she doesn’t think the feelings will ever go completely away. She has her new apartment designed to perfection, hands over her credit card easily, and only stops when she turns around to smile at someone who’s not there.

School is easy and people are easier, mostly because she’s grown up with a lie already masking her face. She smiles at everyone, tries not to throw her money around more than is strictly necessary, and doesn’t skip her classes to fly halfway around the world on a whim.

Her therapist says it’s progress, Fiona says it’s survival.

Besides Holly J the only person she can stand spending time around is Riley, but that’s not really a surprise to either of them; they both hide from the rest of the world but it’s easy to see through each other, and it’s nice to know that life’s hard for other people too. They sit outside The Dot and watch the world go by, and if Riley sees her staring at her phone for too long or she catches him watching Peter through the windows then neither of them mention it.

Mostly though it’s just Fiona, and it’s never been that way. Her first month alone she drinks too much Châteauneuf-du-Pape and watches black and white classics on mute, her eyes fixed on the way the characters’ mouths move. She throws a housewarming party, gets Holly J to make a general announcement at school, and then spends it sitting in her closet listening to the muffled voices of her guests and wishing there was someone sitting opposite her, their legs tangled, hiding out together the way they used to.

She’s been back at Degrassi three months and she’s not spoken to him once. She wonders if it’s as hard for him as it is for her or if he prefers it this way, finds it easier not having her around, and the thought’s enough to have her blinking back angry tears.

She knows she’s coping, knows she’s doing better, but it’s not the same. Not enough.

It’s a Friday night and she’s turned down Holly J’s invite to study and Riley’s invite to Above the Dot in favor of a night in with Thai take-out. Her head feels too clouded, too full, and she tries to remember the breathing techniques her therapist taught her and when that fails she runs herself a bath hot enough to scald and pours in half the bottle of indecently expensive Italian bubble bath her father’s assistant bought her for her last birthday.

The smell of orchid and ginseng floods the room until it’s in her lungs, and Fiona slips out of her clothes slowly, sinks into the bathtub fast enough that her skin turns pink beneath her eyes and keeps going until her head’s under water, the world a faded blur above her. She stays that way until her chest begins to burn and then breaks free, swallows the air and shivers at the sensation of hot against cold.

It’s good to feel something when she spends so much time forgetting to feel anything.

She relaxes, draws shapes behind her eyelids and hums half forgotten songs under her breath and she almost remembers what it’s like to breathe normally.

She’s designing a skirt with her finger through the bubbles when her phone begins to buzz on the counter next to her. Fiona’s ready to tell Holly J she’s busy or just ignore it altogether when she realizes it’s Declan’s face staring back at her on the small screen, and she presses the accept button faster than she knew possible, her heart pounding against her chest.

“Hi,” she says when she remembers to talk.

“I miss you,” he says and she shuts her eyes, closes her fingers tighter around the phone and holds on.

“I miss you too,” she says, and it comes out a little desperate and a lot lost.

“I could come out there –“ he begins, but she cuts him off.

“Don’t.”

He sighs and she knows he gets it, knows he understands that this is what she needs ( _what everyone says she needs_ ), and his being here would just take her right back to step one. It’s enough to have him on the other end of the line, the muffled sound of traffic coming from what must be an open window, and his breathing, soft and even in her ear.

“Where are you?” he says eventually, and she smiles.

“In the bath.”

“You and your baths,” he laughs, and it’s almost honest.

“It’s not as fun when there’s no one fighting for the bathroom,” she says, and she watches the way her toes curl around the edge of the tub as she speaks.

“We’ve never had to fight for a bathroom in our lives,” he points out, and she grins.

“I know,” she says, “but we did anyway.”

“ _Fi_ ,” he says, and his voice sounds choked, miserable, and it kills her and thrills her to know she’s the cause.

“It’s okay,” she says, grabbing the soap and wondering if he can hear the sound the water makes as it splashes against the sides, wonder if he’s visualizing her as she speaks.

They’re silent for awhile the way they only can be with each other, and Fiona can feel the way the haze clears inside her head just from knowing he’s there.

“Do you still –“ he says. “Do you _still?_ ”

She knows what he means, of course she does, and it doesn’t even cross her mind to lie.

“Always,” she says, and she hears the way his breath catches even through the line.

“It can never happen,” he says, and Fiona hums noncommittally.

“One day,” she says, “it’ll just be us and we can do whatever we want to do, be whoever we want to be.”

Declan laughs and it sounds resigned but unsurprised.

“Sure,” he says. “We’ll get a place somewhere in Europe and live out our days throwing extravagant parties for people we don’t know and eating the world’s finest cuisine.”

“We’ll change our names every two years, create new identities and convince everyone we’re secretly Russian spies,” Fiona says, and she’s smiling, can picture it too easily.

“You’ll have a dog called Milan and I’ll collect First Editions that no one will ever touch and it’ll all be too much like a Fitzgerald novel.”

“Maybe we could have a vineyard,” she says, and she can practically see his grin behind her eyes. “Or a zoo.”

“Sure Fi,” he says, voice fond, “we’ll have a zoo.”

There’s the sound of knocking and Declan telling the maid he’ll be right out, and Fiona’s heart drops a little at the thought of another goodbye no matter how small.

“I have to go,” he says, and Fiona nods even though he can’t see her. “I’ll talk to you soon.”

“Yeah,” she says, “soon.”

“Bye Fi,” he says, and she hates how hearing it always makes her feel.

“Declan,” she says before he can hang up, “I love you.”

He pauses then, seems to be considering his reply and that hurts more than anything because he shouldn’t have to, shouldn’t need to.

“Love you too,” he says when her heart begins beating too fast, and she smiles then, feels the way the words flow through her veins and make her skin thrum.

The sound of the call disconnecting isn’t so bad now, she thinks, not when things are starting to be okay again. Better than okay because there really aren’t any secrets between them anymore and that’s the way it should be. Some day, she knows, it really will just be the two of them, but until then she reckons she’ll be okay waiting.

She lets the water go cold around her as she dreams of country manor’s and sunlight as far as the eye can see, and she feels more hopeful than she has in forever.


End file.
